


colour me blue

by holtzmanns



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: (oh my god they were roommates), F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Lesbian AU, Past minor character death, and they were ROOMMATES, another hospital au but diff this time, hospital au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:07:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21776518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/holtzmanns/pseuds/holtzmanns
Summary: Vanessa knows as much about the heart as any cardiologist in a hospital.The four chambers and the valves that connect them. The way that they’re responsible for pumping blood around the entire body, spreading oxygen to where it's needed the most and keeping the cells alive. How the heart is like the engine of a finely tuned machine, a ticking clock beating out a rhythm that the rest of the body falls into step with.Vanessa also knows what happens when the heart begins to fail.Prompt from writ: 'and they were roommates' but make it hospital.
Relationships: Brooke Lynn Hytes/Vanessa Vanjie Mateo
Comments: 56
Kudos: 78





	1. chapter one

**Author's Note:**

> This fic started as a drabble to take a break from my WIPs but then turned into its own beast. It was...an absolute process to write but definitely pushed me in ways that helped me grow as a writer, which is always a good thing.
> 
> CW in this fic for medical terms, hospital stays, uncertainties re: long term illness. I usually don't like to give away spoilers, but I will say that there will no main character deaths in this fic, just to be clear.
> 
> Writ is the absolute best - not only for giving me the prompt, but helping me brainstorm, pushing me to keep writing when I was ready to leave this fic in my google drive forever, and being the best encouragement one could ever ask for. They deserve the world <3

Vanessa knows as much about the heart as any cardiologist in a hospital. 

The four chambers and the valves that connect them. The way that they’re responsible for pumping blood around the entire body, spreading oxygen to where it's needed the most and keeping the cells alive. How the heart is like the engine of a finely tuned machine, a ticking clock beating out a rhythm that the rest of the body falls into step with.

Vanessa also knows what happens when the heart begins to fail.

Her dad keels over during Christmas Day brunch when she’s five, clutching the dining room table with a grip that loosens as he falls off his chair and onto the floor. Vanessa doesn’t understand what death means at the time, not really, at his funeral. The fact that her dad isn’t away on a work trip, that he isn’t ever coming back. That he isn’t going to walk in the door one night in his uniform the way that he always does.

That the stone in the cemetery bearing his name is a finality, a marker that takes his place in this world, now that he’s no longer here. 

Vanessa is twelve and her lungs feel like they’re clawing their way out of her chest in gym class, when the teacher is making them _run faster, damnit_. She doesn’t know that she isn’t supposed to feel like she is going to pass out when she jogs, or as if her insides are collapsing inside of her ribs. She’s not supposed to be seeing white spots in her vision as some of her classmates carry her to the sidelines when her body can’t push her any farther. She shouldn’t be constantly lightheaded, grabbing onto tables and bookshelves and chairs just to keep herself upright. 

There’s appointment after appointment and test after test, specialist after specialist because Vanessa’s mother is fiercely protective, overwhelmingly worried after their unit of three becomes a unit of two. She pushes and pushes and pushes until they get an answer, but it’s one that makes Vanessa’s mom nearly keel over, too.

It’s genetic. Autosomal dominant. Passed on from Vanessa’s dad, making the walls in the chambers of her heart stiffer, rougher. Keeping them from being able to properly pump blood to where her body needs it the most. Enough to create the possibility of heart failure at any time, when the well oiled machine will simply crumble under the pressure.

Vanessa’s told that she’s lucky that they’ve caught it so early. That this means they can test solutions and try different medications to maybe make it easier for her heart to pump, to reduce the strain that it constantly shoulders. When the medications don’t work it’s okay, really, she’s told, because there are less invasive surgical options. Ones to try that don’t put her under for that long or have an extended recovery period and will allow her to bounce back quickly.

Except that she never does. Her heart never heals, never reaches its maximum potential. Hell, her heart never lets her be a regular person, because it’s breaking down more and more no matter what the doctors do. No matter how many surgeries she has.

Vanessa’s twenty five and has to quit her job because she’s used up all of her sick days, and because getting up out of bed in the morning is impossible when her body feels so weak. 

Her mother hopes, prays, lights candles for the possibility that things will get better. That Vanessa will bounce back, that she’ll get to go back to living without having it snatched away from her like it had been from her father.

Except life doesn’t feel like it’s being snatched away, to Vanessa. It’s being dangled in front of her, possibilities that she isn’t quite able to reach because she’s _too weak_ and _can’t exert herself_ because her _heart can’t take it_ , and maybe, just maybe, another procedure will work. Another surgery.

Until she’s twenty six and lying in a hospital bed and in complete heart failure because nothing has worked, and she can’t walk the five steps to the bathroom without the support of a walker.

Because Vanessa needs a new heart.

* * *

Vanessa’s been in the hospital for three months and her current nurse on the cardiology floor is making her scowl.

“It’s not going to be forever. Probably just a few weeks. Then when the floor is less busy, they’ll bring you back.” Asia’s trying to explain why they’re moving Vanessa to another unit the best she can, Vanessa knows. Vanessa just doesn’t get why it has to be _her._

“I’ve been stuck here long enough. Why are y’all moving me? Why not someone else on the floor?” Vanessa crosses her arms, careful not to tug on the various wires attached to her chest that are connected to the monitors behind her displaying her heart activity. 

“Because apparently the universe wanted to make my day harder and give me a headache, like the one that I’m getting from this argument with you.” Asia lightly swats her shoulder before her features soften. “Look. They don’t move people to other floors unless they’re stable. Which must mean that the team needs to keep less of an eye on you, which is a _good_ thing.”

“I guess.” Vanessa grumbles as she says it, because still. Being the one that gets booted off of the cardiac unit because it is too full isn’t a good feeling, not in the least. Instead, it makes her feel like she doesn’t matter to the team, not if they’re fine with pushing her somewhere else. 

“Look on the bright side,” Asia tugs on Vanessa’s phone charger from where it’s hanging off of the side of her bed, blending in with the various wires that are protruding from Vanessa’s frame. “Maybe the room you’re moving to will have an actual working outlet.” 

“It better.” The electrical outlet closest to Vanessa’s bed is sporadic, often failing to charge her phone when she plugs it in. She uses the call button more often than not to get the nurses to plug her phone into outlets that she can’t reach from her bed, ignoring their muttered comments of _that’s not what the call button is for, Vanjie._

“Besides, you get to bond with a new crop of nurses.” Asia fiddles with the monitors above Vanessa’s bed. “Aren’t we boring you yet?

“What are you talking about? I love kiki-ing with y’all.” It’s true. Being in the hospital for an extended period of time can be...lonely. There’s only so long that friends and family will continue to visit, before they realize that the hospital is Vanessa’s new normal. Before they get bored of her.

Before they stop visiting.

But she’s got nurses and therapists close to her age, ones that she’s trying her best to bond with. It’s worked with most of them, especially Asia. The cardiac nurses get her. They’re nice, they gossip with her about their lives and feel like coworkers, at most. Coworkers that give her medication and help her transfer out of her bed and try to keep her alive.

“I’ll miss your ass, that’s for sure.” Vanessa sighs as Asia fiddles with the electrode stuck to her collarbone. 

Asia snorts. “Will you miss me prodding your arm at 7 a.m. to take your vitals?” 

“Better you than some random whack nurse I don’t know.”

“Hey, don’t be mean to them before you even meet them. I heard the general internal medicine team is nice. Kameron is, at least.” Asia’s voice rises slightly as she says the name, and it piques Vanessa’s interest.

“Who’s Kameron?” 

“No one.” 

Vanessa narrows her eyes. “That sounded hella suspicious.”

“She’s a friend.” 

“A friend, huh?” Vanessa nudges Asia’s side, laughing as she scowls.

“So goddamn nosy. Tell me why the other patients don’t needle me like you do?” 

Vanessa grins. “‘Cause I know you love spilling shit too, that’s why. I’ll be sure to say hi to Kameron for you.” 

Asia’s cheeks turn slightly pink. “Don’t you start.” 

* * *

The general internal medicine unit is chaotic. 

Doctors, nurses, family members running back and forth between rooms, instructions being yelled left and right, beeping machines that somehow did not seem as alarming when Vanessa had still been on the cardiology unit. 

While on the cardiology floor, Vanessa had shared her hospital room with a pleasant enough elderly lady who slept for most of the day. So much, in fact, that Vanessa had never actually spoken to her. 

Vanessa’s worried about who they’ll place her with now, as she’s wheeled into her new room. Someone in the throes of delirium who will be up at all hours of the night? Someone who turns the TV up way too high, not letting her sleep? Someone who has too much family that comes to visit, meaning that the room will never be quiet again?

But the girl lying in the bed closest to the window is none of those things. Her hair, albeit mussed, is pulled back into a high ponytail, and her makeup-free face is somehow the most beautiful thing Vanessa’s ever seen.

“Hi.” The girl waves at her, a tentative smile on her face and Vanessa realizes, coincidentally, that she has forgotten the entirety of the English language.

Vanessa’s normally bold, brash enough that she has the confidence to go after girls that she’s into. Except that it’s easier when she’s wearing more than a hospital gown, when she’s standing on her own two feet and not feeling like she’s weaker than a year-old baby.

Vanessa squeaks out something that sounds close to a _hi_ , and wants to groan when it makes the girl’s brow furrow.

“You okay? Not in too much pain, are you? I can call the nurse with my call bell-”

“Nah, I’m fine.” Vanessa mumbles the words under her breath, trying her best to tame the mess of her hair with her fingers as discreetly as she can.

“Okay.” The girl shifts in her bed slightly to face her, and Vanessa notices the way that she flinches in pain as she does. “So, fellow inmate. What are you in for?”

The words make Vanessa let out a surprised laugh, make her feel less wound up. “Got a heart that’s been right messing with me.” 

The girl raises an eyebrow. “Why, did someone break it?” Her expression is deadpan as she says it, and it makes Vanessa snort. 

“Funny. What about you?”

“Appendix nuclear explosion.” The girl points to her abdomen, and Vanessa’s eyes widen at the sutures that criss cross it. “They didn’t get it fast enough and now it’s a mess that they’re still trying to clean up.”

“Damn.” Vanessa lets out a whistle. “So, Miss App-app-appendick, what’s your name?” 

“Appendick?” The girl holds back a giggle.

“What?” Vanessa shrugs. “It sounds right, don’t it?”

“Close enough.” The girl’s smiles are reaching her eyes, and the sight makes the tightness in Vanessa’s chest lessen, if only a little. “Brooke. Yours?”

“Vanessa.” She’s not sure, really, why she doesn’t tell Brooke that her name is Vanjie, considering that most people call her that, anyway. But something about the girl makes her want to hold back on it, see what the girl thinks of her actual name.

“Vanessa. I like it.” A small smile builds on the edge of curve of Brooke’s lip, and for a second, Vanessa feels her regular confidence flow back towards her.

That is, at least, until a nurse bounds into the room, muttering about how it’s about time that Vanessa goes to the bathroom, since she _hasn’t had a bowel movement since yesterday, and we can’t have that, can we?_

Oh, well. She’ll get her game back, somehow. 

* * *

Vanessa finds out that she _likes_ having a roommate who’s actually awake for most of the day. 

Brooke is fun to talk to, almost enough to sometimes make Vanessa forget that she’s stuck in a hospital bed. Almost. Vanessa learns that Brooke is a ballet dancer, part of the corps and working towards becoming a soloist. She’d been performing in a matinee when her appendix ruptured, managing to hold off from collapsing in pain until the curtain call, when she could safely bend over in the wings without any audience members seeing her. 

Brooke’s form underneath her gown is toned, long, looking every part of the graceful dancer she is. Vanessa’s lying if she says that she isn’t mesmerized by the way that Brooke reaches over to grab water from her bedside table, especially with how it’s done with an air of delicateness, lightness. 

“What about you? What’s your story?” Brooke’s propped up by pillows, turned on her side slightly when she asks the question. Her grey eyes aren’t cool but rather they’re warm, inviting, waiting for Vanessa to talk.

Vanessa, for her part, pauses. 

“Oh, y’know,” she tries to keep her face light, her voice casual, “Some shit happening with my heart. Felt some weird beating the other day and they wanna look into it more.”

It’s a lie, maybe, but she doesn’t regret it. 

Ever since she was young, Vanessa’s only been known as the sick girl. The girl who’s always in the hospital. The girl who had missed so much school when she was a kid that she’d had to be taught by a teacher in the hospital. The girl who is unable to keep a job for too long because she has to take off work again and again, days when she’s so weak she can’t get out of bed, other days spent in clinics and at appointments with specialists monitoring her useless excuse of a heart. 

Vanessa hates it. Being defined by something that she has no control over, something that she wish could fix itself because it’s taken over way, way too much of her life. For once, _just once,_ she doesn’t want it to be a big deal. Even though she’s in a hospital. 

Brooke, for her part, buys it. “Wow. Hope they find out. Nothing too serious, you think?” 

“Nah.” Vanessa shrugs. “I’ll be out of here in no time.” 

God, she wishes. 

“What do you do for work?” Brooke looks at her expectantly and it surprises Vanessa, almost, how fast she lets the subject change, because she’s not used to it. Her friends, her family draw out conversations about her shitty heart for ages, fake pitying expressions on their faces that Vanessa wishes she had the power to slap away. 

“Makeup artist.” Vanessa grins when Brooke’s face lights up. “I work at MAC, and got a few freelance clients on the side.” 

So what if MAC shifts are far and few between because she’s not a dependable employee anymore? She’s trying. It helps to be in a job where she gets to rest, sit down quite a bit. Her body wouldn’t be able to handle it otherwise. 

“Is that why you still have mascara on while in the hospital?” Brooke’s smile is cheeky and it makes Vanessa snort. 

“Maybe. Can’t ruin my brand and be fully makeup-free.” 

“You’re still cute without it, though.” Brooke winks at her, or at least Vanessa thinks so, and the sight makes her heart do a little flip in her chest. Is she flirting with her? Vanessa can’t tell. But she’s absolutely going to play into it. 

“So are you, you tall, leggy model.” The words leave Vanessa’s lips before she can stop herself, but Brooke is grinning, thank god, hasn’t taken them in a bad way. 

“Leggy, huh? You can tell even under these blankets?”

Vanessa shrugs. “You can’t get up and show me, so a girl’s gotta assume. How tall are you?”

“Five eleven.”

_“What?”_

Vanessa’s mouth drops open and Brooke’s laughing, _laughing_ at her, but goddamn. Brooke really is an Amazon. 

“Why, how tall are you?” Brooke can’t tell from all the blankets that Vanessa is under, but she doesn’t want to answer, really, not after hearing that Brooke is five eleven.

“Five three.” Vanessa mumbles the words, scowling when Brooke claps a hand over her mouth. “What?”

“You’re tiny!”

“Am _not.”_

“Practically pocket-sized.” 

“I’m tall in personality!” Vanessa huffs and crosses her arms. She’s not that short, she isn’t. 

But Brooke’s still grinning. “So tall. Though I do like short girls.”

Vanessa’s brain is about to short circuit. Is Brooke flirting with her? Or is the extended time being cooped up in a hospital bed making her brain go a little bit loopy? 

Vanessa normally has game. But right now she can’t do much more than stare at Brooke open mouthed, something that Brooke is clearly enjoying. 

“You’ll let bugs fly into your mouth if you keep it open any longer.”

“Shut up.”

* * *

They’re eating shitty hospital food for lunch and Brooke is antsy beside Vanessa. 

“Okay, what?” Vanessa turns to Brooke because she’s been tapping the railing of her bed for the last half an hour. Vanessa wouldn’t press the issue except for the fact that Brooke keeps biting her lip, clinking her fork on her plate, her eyes all shifty. 

“Nothing.” Brooke looks away from her, down at the pasta on her tray that doesn’t appear to be very appetizing, from the way that most of it is still in the bowl. 

“Doesn’t look like nothing.” 

Brooke bites her lip. “They rounded this morning while you were asleep.”

“As they do every morning at 8 a.m., yeah.”

“They wanna do another exploratory surgery.”

“For your appendix?” Vanessa’s eyes widen. Brooke’s complications must be worse than previously thought. 

Brooke pauses. “Hey, look at you pronouncing appendix correctly.”

“Shut up.” Vanessa sticks her tongue out at her. “We’re talking about you right now.”

Brooke sighs. “They wanna see if they’ve missed things. I mean, aside from the first surgery, I’ve never really had any, and I don’t want to go under again. What if things go wrong?”

“Hey, hey.” Vanessa wishes that Brooke were closer so that she could reach over, squeeze her hand. “They do tons of surgeries every day here. They know what they’re doing.”

“But what if this time, they don’t?”

“You don’t know that. But you gotta trust that they do without assuming the worst before it even happens.”

“I guess.” Brooke sighs, and Vanessa wants to tell her, she really does, about the various procedures that she’s gone through as a child to make Brooke feel better, but at the same time…

It’s nice not to be the focus of medical attention for once. 

“When are they thinking of scheduling it for?”

”A week.” 

“Does this mean I can film you coming out of sedation?”

“What?” Brooke looks over at her, lets out a laugh, the exact effect that Vanessa wants. 

“Bet you’ll say hysterical shit.”

“You better not.” 

Vanessa grins. “Sorry, didn’t hear you there. Can’t wait to hear all the crazy things you say.”

“ _Nooo_.” Brooke whines, and Vanessa doesn’t want to tell her that she won’t come back to the unit until the sedation has worn off, because her reaction is making her crack up. 

“Maybe you’ll spill all your deepest darkest secrets.”

“Absolutely not-”

“Maybe you’ll confess your love for your nurse.” Vanessa holds back a laugh at Brooke’s look of horror. 

“Anita’s at least 60!” 

“And quite the looker. Hey, maybe you’re into cougars.” 

“Ugh.” Brooke makes a face but she’s grinning too, Vanessa can see it. “ _Definitely_ not my type.”

“So what is your type?” Vanessa meets Brooke’s gaze with a raised eyebrow, a challenge. Two can play at this game. 

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Brooke wastes no time in answering, winking again, and Vanessa’s definitely not imagined it this time around. 

She’s glad that Brooke goes to take a sip of her coffee, so she can try to come up with at least something coherent. Sure, she’s become more used to being Brooke’s hospital roommate as the days go by, but her gay ass sure hasn’t yet. 

* * *

Vanessa’s cardiologist and physiotherapist and nurse pop into her room one day while Brooke’s asleep. 

“Bad time?” Nina’s holding a clipboard, rifling through the sheets in front of her. Vanessa’s known her cardiologist for long enough that she doesn’t have to call her Dr. West anymore. It’s both a great and terrible feeling. 

Vanessa gives her a look. “You really think I got anything else to do right now?” 

Her physiotherapist, Kameron, snorts, though tries to stifle it under Nina’s gaze. 

“Fair enough.” Nina leans against the wall, peeking over at Brooke. “Are you worried about her overhearing? We can move you outside into the hallway if you want-”

“She’s asleep. Doesn’t matter.” Vanessa waves a hand. “So, any news on the waitlist?”

“Moved up a couple spots, though not by much.” Nina’s face is apologetic, and it makes Vanessa want to scowl. 

“Why am I so damn low on it?” Vanessa doesn’t want to show how scared she really is about it. She’s been waiting for months, months, unable to do much or exert herself lest her heart give out on her. Waiting for the other shoe to drop and for things to go south. It’s like she’s walking on a minefield, about to step on explosives at any time that will finally take her out. 

She wishes it could stop. 

“You’ll move up soon enough. These things are dynamic, they fluctuate.” Nina’s words don’t even look as if they’re convincing to herself, which bodes well for Vanessa. “In the meantime, we’re thinking we may trial another medication. We’ll see if it helps with oxygenation a little bit more.” 

“Sure, why not.” Vanessa’s resigned as she says it, because really, will it even make a difference? Will anything actually change for the better? 

After so many years, she’s stopped hoping. It’s hard to hope when it feels like she has no fight left in her anymore. 

Her situation has been the same since before she was a teenager, and nothing’s changed. She’s still living a half life, one that she can’t fully enjoy because she always has the worries in the back of her mind. Ones that keep her away from everything that she wants to be able to do. 

But she has to tolerate it. She has no choice, not when her doctors and nurses are walking away, waving at her as they go to consult on another patient. Not when they have nothing left to give to her. 

* * *

Vanessa and Brooke fall into a routine, of sorts. They binge shows, alternating episodes of _Schitt’s Creek_ and _90 Day Fiancé_ because they can. They complain about the shitty hospital food, trying to bribe the nurses to get them something better from the cafeteria, a tactic that never quite works. 

It’s another week before Vanessa meets Brooke’s family, arriving in a flurry of buttoned up peacoats to fawn at her bedside. 

“Honestly, Brooke Lynn, why do you have to work so far away from home?” Brooke’s mother is smoothing her hair, tucking it behind her ears, and Brooke looks younger than Vanessa’s ever seen her. 

“I can’t control which ballet company gives me a job, Mom.” Brooke’s eyes are happy, when her sister and her mom pull up chairs at her bedside. It makes Vanessa’s heart tug, just a little. 

“Still, I wish you were closer and we didn’t have to take two flights to get here.” Brooke’s mother sheds her coat on her chair. “Though the food they gave us was quite nice.”

Brooke snorts. “You’re the only person who actually likes airport food.” 

Brooke’s sister turns towards Vanessa then, and the sudden eye contact makes her freeze. Vanessa hadn’t wanted to bother Brooke and her family; she had wanted to look busy, but it’s too late, because Brooke’s sister is waving at her. 

“B, you didn’t even introduce your room buddy.” 

Brooke wrinkles her nose. “Room buddy?” 

“Hey, it fits.” Brooke’s sister shrugs. 

Vanessa finds her voice then, because Brooke’s family looks nice enough. “Vanessa.” 

“Nice to meet you, dear.” Brooke’s mom has kind eyes and Vanessa feels a longing in her heart that isn’t being caused by her existing cardiac problems. 

“Nice to meet y’all, too.” Vanessa grabs a book from her bedside table, buries her face into it while Brooke and her mom and sister continue talking, trying to ignore the realization that her own mom hasn’t visited in weeks. 

It’s not her mom’s fault, it’s really not. Vanessa has to remind herself of that. She gets it. 

The fact that her father died of the same thing makes it…eerie. Vanessa feels like a ticking time bomb, one her mom clearly doesn’t want to watch as she slowly reaches end of her timer, when history will inevitably repeat itself. Vanessa understands why her mom wants to stay away and avoid watching her daughter go down the same route. Save herself from the pain as much as possible and instead burying herself in her work. 

It doesn’t stop Vanessa from feeling lonely, though.

She misses having people. Having her mom brush her hair out of her face, hold her hand while she’s getting tests done. Be there to listen with her with the doctors spew more and more predictions about how her heart is going to hold up. 

It’s not that Vanessa can’t handle the burden, be the foundation on her own. She just misses having reinforcements, strengths around it. 

She misses her mom.

Brooke’s mom and sister leave for the night, but not before bringing the two of them McDonalds. The sight of the bags, with the mouthwatering smell from the food inside wafting around the room, makes Vanessa pause. 

Technically, she’s supposed to avoid foods with excess sodium, as the extra salt makes her heart work harder than it’s supposed to, wears it down faster. But at the same time, she can’t bring herself to care. 

She picks up a burger.

“I haven’t had McDonalds in ages.” Vanessa’s missed burgers, she really has, because there’s only so much bland hospital food she’s been able to take. 

“I’m more of a Swiss Chalet fan, myself.” Brooke’s still munching on her burger, but Vanessa tilts her head.

“The hell is that?”

“Food place in Canada. Lots of roast chicken and gravy.” Brooke’s eyes are already getting a wistful, a faraway look in her eyes as she’s thinking about it. 

Vanessa wrinkles her nose, because it doesn’t sound that appetizing. “That’s some white people fast food.”

Brooke shrugs. “It’s good. The gravy is nectar from the gods.”

“I’ll have to take your word for it.” No wonder Brooke doesn’t mind the hospital food as much. Vanessa looks over at her, the way she’s tossing back some French fries. “Real nice of your mom and sister to bring me some food, too.” 

Brooke smiles, her face all warm and Vanessa’s glad that she has support from her family, at least. “They’re great.”

Brooke pauses then, looking over at her, and Vanessa can tell that she’s figuring out how to word a question. One that Vanessa already knows is coming.

“So, I’ve never seen yours come to visit.” Brooke’s voice is light as she looks down at her food, clearly trying to avoid eye contact. “Do they live far, too?”

Vanessa bites her lip, takes a bite of her burger to give herself time before she has to answer. “Oh, y’know. My mom works a lot, that’s all. Besides, we talk here and there on the phone.”

It’s a lie, and Vanessa knows it, and Brooke does too, from the way Vanessa can see the gears turning in her head. “I’ve never heard you talk to anyone on the phone except-”

“It’s while you’re asleep, drop it.” Vanessa scowls, crossing her arms. She doesn’t mean to snap, she doesn’t, but she doesn’t want to talk about the fact that her mom doesn’t fucking visit and that her friends are too busy with their own lives and settling down and she’s been left behind. 

She doesn’t want to.

“Okay, sorry.” Brooke holds her hands up in defeat and Vanessa almost feels bad. Almost. “Won’t bring it up.”

“Good.” Vanessa takes a bite of her burger, chewing with a little more force than necessary, and she wonders why she’s feeling a bit more out of breath than usual.

* * *

Kameron knocks on their door while Vanessa and Brooke are discussing the finer points of the latest season of _Stranger Things._

“I’m just saying, the ending was a cop out-”

“Was _not-_ ”

“Ahem.” Kameron’s grinning at both of them when Vanessa’s about to talk about the next potential season. “As much as I want to join in this discussion, I gotta take you one after the other for physio.”

Vanessa lets out a grumble that is mirrored by Brooke, and it makes Kameron snort. “Y’all are quite a pair. So, who’s gonna suffer first?”

Vanessa’s mouth drops open when Brooke immediately points in her direction. “Traitor!”

Brooke shrugs. “You snooze, you lose.”

Vanessa huffs but does her best to sit up nonetheless, letting Kameron bring her walker over to the side of her bed. 

“Can I ditch this thing yet? I feel old as hell.” Vanessa hates the damn walker. It only serves to remind her of how weak she’s gotten.

“As soon as you can walk the length of the unit without near collapsing on me, it’s gone.” Kameron’s hand is on her back to steady her as she stands. Vanessa hates how much she has to lean her weight on the thing. 

“Walkers are for the elderly.” Nonetheless, Vanessa clutches the handles to keep her balance.

“Technically, it’s a rollator.”

“Giving it a fancy Transformers name ain’t helping.”

Brooke’s watching them with a thoroughly entertained expression. “You always this much fun in physio sessions, Vanessa?”

Vanessa sticks her tongue out at her. “I’m a delight.”

“Not sure if that’s the word I’d use.” Kameron snickers, poking her shoulder when she begins to protest. “C’mon, time to walk and build up that strength.”

Vanessa’s drained after one lap around the unit, gripping the handles of the walker with shaky hands and Kameron’s hands keeping her half-upright. By the time they get back to the room, Vanessa’s bed feels like heaven rather than the prison that it usually is. 

“You good?” Brooke’s brow is furrowed in concern as she sits up from her own bed, ready for her turn to walk with Kameron. 

“Yeah, fine.” So what if the words come out in a slight wheeze? It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t mean anything. “I’m good.” 

Except that Vanessa feels like her body’s made of lead, pulling her down, down, down into the earth to never be able to get up again. Not with the way she’s exhausted from just one lap around the floor. 

“That tired you out more than usual.” Kameron’s brow knits in concern as she lowers the head of Vanessa’s bed.

“I’m fine.” Still, Vanessa has to close her eyes, catch her breath as she says it. Not a convincing lie.

Thankfully, Kameron lets the subject drop, and part of Vanessa hopes that Brooke’s laps around the floor take longer so that she has a second on her own to contemplate how messed up her life really has become. 

* * *

“So, she says it’s to match the ‘rainforest’ theme that’s been chosen for the party, right? Well, get this. She goes orange and green. Orange and green! Who fucking wants that for a look?”

Brooke’s laughing at everything Vanessa is saying and Vanessa can’t help the way she preens a little, embraces it. “What did it turn out like?”

“Oh, hideous.” Vanessa waves a hand, laughing when Brooke claps a hand over her mouth. “She looked like a fucking weird snake creature.”

“Oh my god. You’re ridiculous.” Brooke’s giggling, and Vanessa never, ever wants to stop hearing the sound of it. “Are you this indulgent with all your clients?” 

“Only the crazy bitches who’d try and fight me if I didn’t do exactly what they wanted. Even if the final look was more scary than anything.” Vanessa pauses, remembering the client, along with every other person she’s done makeup for. “Didn’t want them to speak with no manager.”

“You should do my makeup sometime. It would be fun?” Brooke phrases it like a question, and her smile is tentative, but it makes Vanessa gasp, try and sit up, before falling right back down on her pillow.

“Are you kidding me? Absolutely. I’ll make you all banjie, fit my aesthetic.” She’s excited just thinking about it. Brooke’s high cheekbones, her eyes, her bone structure-

Vanessa’s only ruminating on all of it because of the possibilities for makeup, that’s all. No other reason. 

Nope.

Brooke wrinkles her nose. “What’s banjie?’

Vanessa can’t help but grin. “Oh, this is gonna be fun.” 

Vanessa makes a mental note to her own body to get its shit together. To allow her to fucking sit up again without running out of breath, becoming light headed, feeling weak. She has a new client, after all. 

The attending doctor and resident and nurses pass by for their evening rounds as Vanessa’s describing the kind of makeup look she wants to try out on Brooke. The attending frowns when he looks up at the monitors above Vanessa’s bed, a sight that makes Vanessa’s stomach churn in unease. She hates that look.

“Miss Mateo’s sats are getting pretty low, aren’t they?”

“Hello? I’m right here.” Vanessa stops just short of lifting up a hand, snapping it in the healthcare team’s faces. She hates the way they pretend to talk above her sometimes, as if she’s not privy to conversation about her own body. 

The attending pays her no mind, turning towards her nurse instead. “I’d say lets try nasal prongs for the next couple hours, see if that increases her oxygen saturation.” 

Vanessa tilts her head slightly, looking up at the monitor behind her. Eighty nine percent. She knows from years and years of being in the hospital that anything below ninety five percent is considered low, and that dropping saturation levels mean that she’s not getting the oxygen she needs, that her heart isn’t doing a good job of pumping the blood to where it’s supposed to go. 

She doesn’t want a tube by her nose, though. It would make her look sicker than she already is.

“Don’t I get a choice?” She grumbles the words and only the resident hears her, sympathetically reaching out to pat her shoulder.

“It’s only to help you.” The attending doctor doesn’t even look up as he says it, and it makes Vanessa bristle. 

The doctors to round on the next patient without much room for argument, and Vanessa’s nurse is apologetic as she brings over a set of nasal prongs. 

“They’ll make you feel better, promise.” Scarlet hands over the tubing to Vanessa so that she can put it on herself, and part of Vanessa appreciates it, that someone at least is recognizing her competency.

“Don’t mean I gotta like it.”

Brooke turns to her as Scarlet leaves the room. “Gotta say, you pull them off well.”

“Don’t you even start with me.”

“Latest fall trend?”

Vanessa snorts in spite of herself. “I know what you’re tryna do.”

“What?” Brooke’s face is the picture of innocence, and it makes Vanessa feel a little bit lighter, with how she’s playing along.

“Tryna make me feel better.”

Brooke tuts. “I’m doing nothing of the sort. Just saying that you’ve started a new couture look. Might have to pick up a pair myself.”

Brooke winks at her, and Vanessa can’t help the small smile that’s growing on her face. “Still. Thanks.” 

“I get how it feels, being stuck in here. It’s...not easy.” Brooke bites a lip. “I’m glad it’s you that I’m sharing a room with, and we have a blast, but I feel-”

“Powerless?” 

“Yeah.” Brooke’s looking up at her, all traces of previous joking gone. “Like we’re disconnected from everything on the outside.”

“God, I get it.” Vanessa really does. Everyone’s moving on without them, getting farther and farther in life. Working, settling down, doing something with themselves. “Everyone’s doing things while we can’t.” 

“At least this isn’t going to be forever. We’ll be back out there in no time.” Brooke’s smile is encouraging, and it makes Vanessa’s stomach turn a little, because Brooke will.

She won’t.

Though she doesn’t want Brooke to know. Doesn’t want her to worry.

“Yeah, we’ll get better before we know it.”

If only.

* * *

Their room feels just a little bit too empty to Vanessa when Brooke is whisked away for her surgery. It’s strange - back on the cardiology unit, she had relished the chance to have some peace and quiet. Now, though? She can’t stand the silence. 

Their little micro-universe feels like it’s slipping away as Brooke begins to heal. She needs to stay in bed less, being less tired as the days go on, walking more and more with physio. 

Vanessa’s happy for her, she is, because being stuck in a hospital bed is not something she would wish on anyone. The mundaneness. The feeling of helplessness. Watching everyone come and go, walking past their room without any inkling of how lucky they are just to be up and moving.

But at the same time, she wishes she was improving at the same rate. It doesn’t feel like it’s going to happen any time soon. Vanessa’s been needing the nasal prongs more often than not, no matter how much she grumbles as she wears them. She gets lightheaded, weaker, without them, closer to passing out the longer she tries to keep them off to prove that they’re not necessary. 

Her stupid excuse of a heart is truly testing her patience. 

Kameron doesn’t push her to walk anymore, something that makes Vanessa pissed, because she’s still gotta try, damn it. But at the same time, she’s grateful. She doesn’t want Brooke to see how weak she’s gotten. Hell, she doesn’t even want to know the whole scope of it herself. She doesn’t want to deal with it anymore.

She wants things to go back to normal. Well, as normal as they’ve ever been. For Vanessa, normal is being able to walk and talk and work and not be in the hospital. That’s all that she wants.

Brooke is dangling her feet from the edge of her bed one afternoon when they’ve finished a _Jeopardy_ episode. “I’m still hungry.”

“We just had lunch.” Vanessa’s half right, because Brooke had her lunch. Vanessa’s not that hungry.

“You haven’t been out of bed in days. Let’s go somewhere. Let’s grab coffee from the cafeteria.” Brooke’s looking excited by the idea, standing up and slipping on her shoes. Without her walker, since she doesn’t need it anymore.

Vanessa’s only a little bit jealous.

“I’m tired as hell.” It’s not a lie, because Vanessa really is. Except that there’s not a time these days that she isn’t.

“Are you sure? Want me to bring you something back?” Brooke’s question makes Vanessa smile, just a little. 

“I’m fine.”

Vanessa doesn’t want Brooke to know that Kameron downgraded her to using only a wheelchair, rather than the walker. It’s embarrassing. She doesn’t want to use it. So, she’s not going to. So what if she’s going to be in bed forever now?

Brooke is unfazed. “‘Kay. I’ll be back.”

She’s waltzing out of the room before Vanessa can even say goodbye, past the four walls that are slowly becoming the only part of the world that Vanessa is exposed to these days.

* * *

Vanessa tugs off the nasal prongs when Brooke gets back. Brooke raises an eyebrow as she does, but doesn’t comment. Hands her a muffin instead.

“I wanna get out of here.” Vanessa’s made up her mind.

Brooke takes a sip of her soft drink. “Thought you were tired.”

“I’m always tired. I don’t wanna be tired here.” 

Vanessa doesn’t want to have to die while staring at the same four walls day in and day out. A prison of her body’s making, her heart the instigator that’s dooming her to a half, trapped life that may not even last that long. 

If this is all she’s going to get, if this is the extent of her future? She doesn’t care anymore.

“Are you even allowed to leave the unit?”

Brooke’s question is valid, but it makes Vanessa scowl, tuck the red bracelet that denotes she can’t under her sleeve. “Doesn’t matter.”

Why should it even be an issue? Why does Vanessa have to spend her already shitty existence trapped where she doesn’t even want to be? 

“Pretty sure nursing will ream you out if you try and go.” Brooke’s biting her lip now, and Vanessa’s starting to regret ever roping her into it. Someone who still has an inkling of self preservation left, someone who’s still trying to play within the rules. 

Brooke deserves better than her.

“They’ll get over it. Come on, it’ll be fun.” She wiggles her brows, and she can see Brooke’s resolve beginning to break. “We can be like Bonnie and Clyde or some shit.”

“Okay, but didn’t Bonnie and Clyde rob people-”

“Irrelevant.” Vanessa waves her hand before pointing at the wheelchair in the corner of the room, still folded up and unused. Brooke gives in, walking over to grab it and bring it towards the side of her bed. Success. 

Vanessa takes a deep breath before attempting to get up. Sure, physio and nursing had drilled the importance of having two people helping her transfer to and from the bed. Saying that she’s a falls risk, that she can hurt herself with the slightest of missteps. 

But when Vanessa’s able to get her butt into the wheelchair with just a smidge of exertion, she smiles for the first time in days. Nursing and physio can suck it. 

* * *

Brooke giggles as she pushes Vanessa’s wheelchair into the hospital’s atrium, past the piano and the front desk and the small garden. “I feel like we’re fugitives.”

Vanessa cranes her neck to look up at her. “Does that make me precious cargo?”

Brooke snorts. “You’re priceless.”

Vanessa can’t help the way that she peeks around the hallways as the walk, eyes out for any nursing from their unit, any therapists or physicians that could spot them and wonder why she’s not on the unit.

It’s fine. She’ll be fine. She can go without her nasal prongs for twenty minutes. She can handle being up in the chair for the length of time it takes to get a fucking coffee.

At least, that’s what she’s trying to tell herself as Brooke pushes her up to the Starbucks. 

Brooke’s debating between a London Fog or a latte, and Vanessa’s never noticed, really, how pretty Brooke’s eyes are. How her face lights up while she’s scanning the menu, how delicate her movements are as she goes to pay. Even as a patient in a hospital, Brooke manages to glow. Vanessa’s not sure whether to be jealous or infatuated.

But by the way she can feel her own cheeks heat up as Brooke passes her drink to her, she has an inkling of which one it could be. 

* * *

Vanessa’s breathless as they head back, dropping her head to rest on her hand. She’s still giggling over the pianist’s song choices in the lobby, and can hear Brooke doing the same as she pushes her chair. 

The elevator ride back up to the unit feels final, as if they’re reaching the end of something. Vanessa tries to ignore the feeling and push it away, to focus instead on how she and Brooke had people watched in the lobby, giving every passing by patient or doctor or nurse an outlandish backstory. How Brooke had given her a sip of her drink, taken a sip of hers in return. How Vanessa hadn’t felt like a patient for once, ignoring the aches and pains in her body and the straining in her chest so that she could focus on the way Brooke beamed at her, eyes alight and full of so many possibilities. 

Except the lightness in her chest drops, pulling her back down deep into the earth like an anchor as soon as the doors of the elevator open back up. 

Because there’s a gaggle of nurses. Doctors. Her cardiologist. Her… _mom?_

A group of people looking very, very, mad. 

Vanessa shrinks in the wheelchair as she hears Brooke gulp above her. 

Whoops.


	2. chapter two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Brooke is biting at her lip when Vanessa is finally, finally wheeled back into her room. Vanessa tries not to look at Brooke as the nurses help her back into her bed, tries to ignore the burning that she feels from her worried gaze. 
> 
> Brooke, for her part, waits until the nurses have shut the door behind them, shifting in her bed to face her properly. Vanessa wants to close her eyes, brace herself against the questions that she knows are coming. 
> 
> “You’re really sick.”
> 
> “And?” Vanessa runs a hand through her hair, trying to ignore the way her fingers catch on her nasal prongs. 
> 
> “Why didn’t you tell me?” It’s not accusatory, per se, but Vanessa can hear the desperation, the hurt in Brooke’s voice, over the fact that she didn’t know. 
> 
> “Does it matter?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Previously on:   
> _The elevator ride back up to the unit feels final, as if they’re reaching the end of something. Vanessa tries to ignore the feeling and push it away, to focus instead on how she and Brooke had people watched in the lobby, giving every passing by patient or doctor or nurse an outlandish backstory. How Brooke had given her a sip of her drink, taken a sip of hers in return. How Vanessa hadn’t felt like a patient for once, ignoring the aches and pains in her body and the straining in her chest so that she could focus on the way Brooke beamed at her, eyes alight and full of so many possibilities._
> 
> _Except the lightness in her chest drops, pulling her back down deep into the earth like an anchor as soon as the doors of the elevator open back up._
> 
> _Because there’s a gaggle of nurses. Doctors. Her cardiologist. Her… mom?_
> 
> _A group of people looking very, very, mad._
> 
> _Vanessa shrinks in the wheelchair as she hears Brooke gulp above her._
> 
> _Whoops._
> 
> Thank you so much for the wonderful feedback on the first chapter! This one's going to be a short story, only one more chapter after this. Hope you enjoy. Writ remains the best ever for betaing and encouraging me throughout writing this, and this story would absolutely not exist without them <3

“-She’d taken off her nasal prongs, the reduction in oxygen saturation could have been fatal-”

“-transferring without a two person assist, especially as a falls risk is _extremely_ dangerous, not to mention that she’d refused any orientation or training with the wheelchair beforehand-”

“-honestly Vanessa, you put not only your life on the line, but you scared the entire team, we were _this_ close to calling a code yellow and starting a manhunt across the entire hospital-”

“-Mija, your father didn’t leave us just so you could act so _irresponsible-”_

Vanessa wants to scream, drown out all the voices that are threatening to overtake her brain and never let her think straight again. 

_“_ Fuck _.”_

She lets it drop under her breath, barely hearing the words being said around her that are blurring into a grey cloud above her head. The ones from her healthcare team and her mom as they try to lecture her about things that they just don’t fucking get. 

They don’t know what it’s like to be trapped in a bed, too weak to move and be a part of things and actually live for once. They’re all able to leave the hospital behind, head home once they’re done their shifts or visits and compartmentalize, because they’re not tied to the building. They don’t understand the feeling of being so dependent on others, so out of control about their own lives. 

They don’t get it. 

Vanessa her hands into fists as Nina starts fretting about ‘ _potential complications with the medications because of the lack of oxygen support_ ’ and the pain radiating in her palms from her nails digging into her skin is grounding, somehow. Reminding her that she’s still here, she’s alive. Even though she’s stuck in an ‘emergency family meeting’ that’s been called for her, as if she’s a criminal or something. 

As if not complying to hospital recommendations exactly how they want her to makes her deviant. 

She doesn’t want to be here anymore. What’s the point, if she’s not going to be here much longer, if she’s not going to move up the waitlist for a new heart, if she’s going to keel over like her dad before she ever gets one? If she has to spend the entirety of her existence following the directions of others who’ll never understand what everything is like?

“I’m leaving. I’m out.”

The table goes comically silent once the words leave her lips, as everyone turns towards her with wide eyes. 

Nina speaks first. “Vanessa, what do you-”

“I’m going. I don’t wanna be in the hospital anymore, I don’t care.” She doesn’t need to stay here to stay alive. She can do it on her own, she can leave.

“Don’t be stupid.” Her mom snaps in her direction, and it makes Vanessa bristle, because she’s not being stupid, she’s _not._ She’s just fucking tired. 

“Why can’t y’all see it? There’s no point, I ain’t getting better anytime soon.” The words make her swallow hard because of their finality, the weight of their meaning and how true they feel. 

Vanessa’s not getting better. 

Her mom’s looking at her like she wants to argue and Nina’s eyes are full of sympathy and Vanessa’s never hated it more. 

Vanessa continues because no one at the table says anything, none of the nurses or doctors because really, what are they going to tell her? That she’s getting better? 

Even Vanessa’s more realistic than that. 

“I’m stuck here and can’t leave my bed and can’t even do anything I wanna, while everyone else is getting better and leaving all around me. Why do I gotta spend my end in a hospital bed?” Vanessa can’t stop her voice from breaking at the end and it makes her mad, the way she has to wipe tears that are beginning to form. 

“You’re not at your end, Vanessa. I understand how it can feel like that, how things haven’t been improving. But that doesn’t mean that they won’t in the future. We still have more things we can try-”

“They ain’t going to work. We know that. Nothing does. Unless y’all got a spare heart to give me but we know that ain’t possible.” She lets out a bitter laugh. 

There’s a finality of sorts, when one accepts their own mortality. Realizing that they’re not going to be around forever, that their time is limited. 

Vanessa’s heart already feels like it’s taking some of its last beats. 

She’s not sure how she can tell. Maybe it’s the way that it lays so heavy in her chest, a sign that it was never, ever meant to work. A sign that she was never meant to be here for a long time in the first place. 

Vanessa’s calm. It doesn’t make her want to cry, or scream about how unfair it is. It’s a bittersweet acceptance that lets her relax, stop fighting for once in her life. 

Though Nina doesn’t let her have it for long. 

“Maybe we should hold off a couple more days, see what else we can do. Then we can have another meeting, talk through some other options if you don’t want to stay here.” Nina reaches out, grabbing her hand, and Vanessa can feel her resolve crumbling because the woman is too convincing for her own good. “Is a few days okay, Vanessa? Just a few.” 

Nina’s looking at her with big googly eyes and her mother’s looking at her with a death glare, and the rest of the healthcare team looks like they really want to have their lunch. But it’s nice to be in control of the cards for once, be the one who gets to make a decision rather than having one made for her. 

A sense of control that she never gets. 

“Fine. A couple of days, but that’s it.”

She doesn’t want to give more of herself to the hospital if she doesn’t have to. 

* * *

Brooke is biting at her lip when Vanessa is finally, finally wheeled back into her room. Vanessa tries not to look at Brooke as the nurses help her back into her bed, tries to ignore the burning that she feels from her worried gaze. 

Brooke, for her part, waits until the nurses have shut the door behind them, shifting in her bed to face her properly. Vanessa wants to close her eyes, brace herself against the questions that she knows are coming. 

“You’re really sick.”

“And?” Vanessa runs a hand through her hair, trying to ignore the way her fingers catch on her nasal prongs. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” It’s not accusatory, per se, but Vanessa can hear the desperation, the hurt in Brooke’s voice, over the fact that she didn’t know. 

“Does it matter?” 

Vanessa so, so badly, wants it not to matter. Wants it all to go away, wants to be someone who heals. Who isn’t bound to the hospital with an iron chain around her ankle.

But she’s going to be orbiting it for the rest of her damn life. 

Vanessa feels helpless, stuck. Physically, she is. She can’t leave for anywhere on her own, doesn’t have the strength to. So, what does it matter? What does it matter that she didn’t tell Brooke? 

Just because she has to be resigned to her life doesn’t mean that others have to, as well. 

“Yes, it does!” Brooke’s voice _breaks_ and Vanessa finally looks over, stops fiddling with the thin sheets that drape over her form, and Brooke’s expression is a mixture of anger and pain both. “You’re doing things that are risky and could hurt you and-”

“Didn’t see you complaining when we went down to the cafeteria.” Vanessa crosses her arms, grumbles because it isn’t fair, Brooke isn’t being fair, not when she’s the one person who’s supposed to be on her side.

“Because I didn’t know that you were so sick that you _practically need a new heart_. That’s not a normal level of heart problems, that’s being-at-death’s-doorstep level of heart problems and you don’t even seem to care.” Brooke’s looking at her with that face that she gets from most people in her life, one full of sadness and anger and pity and Vanessa hates it.

“What clued you in? The extra oxygen? Me not being able to use a walker anymore?” Vanessa lets out a bitter laugh as she says it, shaking her head. “Being basically bedridden?”

“You could have told me.” The words are quiet, from Brooke’s lips. Vanessa looks over and she’s looking down at her own sheets and she sounds so _defeated_ and the twisting in Vanessa’s chest is not entirely coincidental.

“And have you look at me with that same face you’re making right now? I see the pity there. I see it from everyone.” Vanessa crosses her arms. “I hate it. I don’t need your pity.”

She really doesn’t. Others giving her sympathetic looks that amount to _‘sorry that you’re dying’_ feel pathetic. Useless.

“I’m not-” Brooke lets out a frustrated sigh and Vanessa can see the way her brow furrows before she continues. “I’m not pitying you, don’t you get it? I’ve been on this side, I get what it’s like to be almost at death’s door.”

“You don’t. You don’t get it.” Vanessa wipes at the stray tear along her lashes with more force than she needs to. “It’s not the same.”

“Like hell it isn’t.” Brooke’s mad, and Vanessa can’t help the way her own voice rises in response, ready to argue.

“You ain’t been stuck with that shitty appendix your whole life, worrying about it all crashing down eventually. This was just a freak thing that happened to you. And look at you.” Vanessa gestures to Brooke, at the way she’s able to sit up without any help. “You’re getting stronger, you’re gonna leave soon. So no, it’s not the same.”

“So then why shoulder that burden by yourself? Why pretend like not much is wrong when it clearly is?” Brooke’s pleading, her eyes wide and no matter how much Vanessa doesn’t want it, she can already feel the way her resolve is beginning to crumble, the way it seems to do with Brooke.

“Because everyone leaves!” The words are out before Vanessa can stop them and no, no, _no_ , she wasn’t supposed to say them but now she can’t take them back, no matter how quickly she claps a hand over her mouth.

But it’s true. Everyone leaves for good at some point, never to come back. Her mom and the rest of her family. Her friends. Her coworkers. Leaving Vanessa alone with the four blank walls and endless beeping machines for company.

Because everyone else is busy living their own lives, right?

Vanessa shouldn’t be the one to keep them from doing so.

Brooke’s going to leave. Vanessa knows that now, knew it a couple days back, too. They’d been discussing a discharge date for Brooke during morning rounds since her surgery had been successful, and she’s on the path towards healing. She’ll be just fine real soon.

And it’s fine, it really is. Brooke is going to leave, go back to her shitty apartment in the city and her two cats that are also her phone background. She’s going to go back to her position in the corps and back to ballet, back to pushing her heart harder and harder as she dances, in a way that Vanessa will never be able to do with hers.

There’s no reason for Brooke to stay, no matter how desperately Vanessa wants there to be.

Vanessa’s not selfish. She’s not an anchor that’s going to pull Brooke down with her, keeping her from going after her dreams and living her own life. Because Brooke deserves better than that.

Despite the fact that Brooke seems to disagree, by the disbelief lining her furrowed brow and parted lips.

“I’m not.”

“You shouldn’t feel obligated-”

“How can you say that?” Brooke’s looking at her with wide eyes as she fists her hands in her sheets, and Vanessa can feel every beat of her own heart, every gasp from her lungs. “After all of this?”

“After what?” Vanessa can feel a lump in her throat and she’s not going to cry, she’s _not_ , she doesn’t need it right now, not in front of Brooke. “Being stuck with me ‘cause we’re hospital roommates? You telling me that nothing’s gonna change after you’re discharged? When you can go back to your life and I’m still here, the way I’m always gonna be here? You telling me that?”

Brooke’s going to go back to her life. Vanessa’s going to be left behind. It’s not Brooke’s fault, not Vanessa’s either. 

But it’s happened with everyone. It’ll happen with Brooke, too. 

“I-”

“You’re gonna get to go back, Brooke. I won’t.” The finality of the words don’t make Vanessa wince, don’t make her upset. Because the words are simply the truth.

“But I’m not.” Brooke’s jaw is set, even though her hands are shaking and Vanessa wants to reach out and grab them, hold her steady, despite the fact that she’s being stupid.

“What do you mean, you’re not?”

“Ness, you’re-” Brooke’s jerky, halting, not looking as her as she pauses, not as if she’s trying to figure out what to say, but rather as if she’s trying to get the words to leave her mouth. “It doesn’t matter if I’m getting discharged. I’m not-”

Brooke cuts herself off, drawing in a breath and Vanessa can see the pleading behind her eyes, but it doesn’t make sense. So she pushes her more. 

“You’re not what?” 

“I’m not leaving you, okay? Even once I’m discharged I’m gonna be in that chair beside your bed, I’m gonna be here on evenings and weekends ‘cause I’m not leaving you.” Brooke’s so convinced of what she’s saying that she’s leaning over in her bed, scooting closer towards Vanessa, an earnest expression on her face. 

Except that the words aren’t placating; instead, they make Vanessa want to shut her eyes tight, real tight. There’s a part in her heart that so very desperately wants them to be real. For what Brooke is saying to actually happen. 

Except Vanessa knows that it won’t. They’re empty words now, words that Brooke will forget once she’s back at home and is dancing again and not even thinking twice about her hospital stay after she’s all healed. When Vanessa will only be a blink in her memory of the entire ordeal. 

So the words instead feel like thorns, sharp and stinging along Vanessa’s chest and prickling without drawing blood, ones that taunt and tease her. She wants to pull them out, throw them far away from her where they can’t hurt her heart more than they already have. 

Vanessa, until recently, has kept her heart safe. She’s been okay with people leaving, expects it. But now? Brooke dangling a promise of her not leaving, one which she won’t want to even keep later? 

It makes Vanessa mad. 

“Don’t promise shit you can’t keep.” The words drop from Vanessa’s lips like poison, letting her keep Brooke at arms length, like she should be. 

Brooke narrows her eyes. “You think I won’t?” 

“I know you won’t.” 

It’s a lie, because she _doesn’t,_ because what if Brooke stays, what if she comes back to visit? 

But Vanessa isn’t willing to take the risk of hoping and hoping and wishing and then being disappointed. Her heart is faulty enough. 

“You don’t know shit.” Brooke crosses her arms and it isn’t fair, the way she looks hurt, it’s not. Because what does Brooke have to be hurt over?

“What don’t I know?” Vanessa knows plenty. She knows that nothing is forever, not even roommates that make her forget, sometimes, how much her chest feels like it’s caving in on itself, how much her body feels like it’s on its last legs. She knows that everyone has more important things to do than sit at a sick girl’s bedside, including Brooke. 

“That I actually care about you, despite the fact that you seem to think I don’t.” 

“I never said that-”

“You really think I’m gonna just leave?” Brooke’s voice is small, and Vanessa hates how much it’s affecting her. How much she doesn’t want Brooke to leave and never come back, either. But she knows what’s going to happen in the end. 

“Everyone does.” 

It’s true. And there’s nothing Vanessa can do about it. 

“I’m not everyone.” Brooke’s looking at her with such an intensity that Vanessa wants to believe the words. Have them be true, have a chance where Brooke and her get to stay this close. 

She wants it so bad. 

But Brooke’s right. Brooke isn’t everyone. Brooke is...sunlight in their dreary hospital room, her smile enough to pull Vanessa out of her thoughts every time. Brooke is the way she gasps during their _Great British Bake Off_ marathons, so caught up in the competition that she lets out little cheers every time her favourite contestant does well. Brooke is the content expression on her face whenever she shows Vanessa pictures of her cats, tells her stories about the funny things they love to do. 

Brooke’s different from any other roommate she’s had, and Vanessa’s scared of how much she’s begun to matter to her. She’s taken more of Vanessa’s heart, her stupid malfunctioning heart, more than she wants to admit. 

“You’re right. You ain’t everyone.” The admission is freeing, in a way. Brooke’s light and drive and the way she melts over certain things make her so special, so quintessentially Brooke. Someone who doesn’t deserve to be hung up over a person like Vanessa, someone who’s expiry date is a lot earlier than everyone else her age. 

Brooke deserves better. 

“And you aren’t, either, Ness.” Vanessa can see the affection in Brooke’s eyes, and half of her loves it, craves it. Wants Brooke to snuggle in closer to her, bridge that gap between them. But the other half of Vanessa knows how dangerous it can be to care for someone whose very existence isn’t guaranteed. 

Vanessa remembers the way her mother became a shell of a person after her father’s death. The way she’d kept his favourite flannel around her shoulders, kept the photo album from happier years in her lap and held onto it like it was a lifeline. Like it would bring him back, while letting everything else around her fall to pieces, into dust. 

Maybe it’s better if she and Brooke don’t become closer. In case, just in case things go south, and she leaves Brooke by herself to deal with the aftermath. 

Vanessa doesn’t want Brooke to suffer too. 

“B, I’m-” Part of Vanessa is trying to hold her back, stop from continuing, because she likes Brooke, dang it, and has someone in her life that thinks that she matters, and why is she going to try and ruin it?

But the other half of her knows it’ll be better for Brooke, in the long run. 

“I’m really sick.”

Brooke doesn’t even flinch. “No shit. Pretty sure the entire ward heard the yelling in your emergency family meeting.”

Vanessa lets out a huff, because Brooke’s not actually getting it. “No, like really sick. Waiting for my own damn mortality to punch me in the face-type sick.”

“So?” Brooke raises an eyebrow, as if it’s a challenge. 

“You don’t - you don’t wanna see that. Trust me. It’s downhill from here, it ain’t gonna be pretty. It’s gonna be me and a bunch of tubes against the world. It’s gonna be shitty.”

The reality of it is starting to set in more and more for Vanessa with each laboured breath she takes, every phantom pain that tugs along her body. She really is shutting down. 

Brooke shoots her a look. “If this is some half assed attempt to push me away, it’s not working.”

Vanessa huffs, ignoring the way she’s beginning to feel a little lightheaded, a little tired from so much talking. “I ain’t joking. I ain’t gonna be like this all the time. It’s gonna keep getting worse and you shouldn’t have to watch-”

“You think me magically leaving you right now is somehow going to make that easier? For me _or_ you?” Brooke sits up in her bed, her voice raising a little along with the disbelief written along her face, the furrow of her brow. “You think trying to cut me out is going to solve anything?”

Vanessa scowls. “It’s not like that.” It’s _not._ Brooke’s missing the point, that if they stay close she’s going to suffer, that she’s just going to make it worse for herself in the long run. 

“Like hell it isn’t. You’re trying to protect me from something that may not even happen. And even if it does, you think I’d even want to stay away in the first place? That I wouldn’t want to be beside you the entire time?” Brooke says the words like they’re obvious, as if there isn’t anything she’d rather do. Which makes it just a little bit harder for Vanessa to try and drive her point home.

“You have your own life, B. A normal life. It ain’t this.” Vanessa points to the monitors behind her, wincing as she does because when did lifting her arm up slightly cause so much pain? 

“My life is dancing for most of the day and stumbling home to a wet basement apartment with only my cats for company. It’s always just been pushing myself in ballet at the expense of everything else, letting it all go because ballet is supposedly worth it.” Brooke looks at Vanessa with those eyes that she can never tell if they’re grey or blue and Vanessa sees a mountain of unspoken words behind them. “But then I met you, and the appendix issues and near-sepsis and other infections my body was going through stopped mattering, none of the pain or extra surgeries mattered anymore.”

Brooke takes a deep breath before continuing, fiddling with her hands. “Because I’ve never laughed as much as when we’re joking around, never had as much fun as when we watch things together. Never told anyone as much about myself, let anyone else in like I’ve let you.”

Vanessa remembers back to one night a few weeks ago, when the two of them had stayed up until the early hours of the morning, whispering to each other so as not to disturb the nurses. Talking about their pasts, their futures. Where they wanted to go, what they wanted to do if they ever had the chance. Brooke had listened to Vanessa attentively when she brought up the idea of connecting with her dad’s side of the family again. Convinced her that it wasn’t a stupid idea, that she should do it. 

Brooke’s already entrenched herself in Vanessa’s life through the way their memories and thoughts have become ensnared like vines, making it impossible for them to let go of each other. 

But the longer Brooke spends close to Vanessa, the more it’s going to hurt her. 

“I’m not here forever, B. The laughing and jokes and TV shows and late night talks are gonna be temporary. One day it’s all gonna end, and you’re gonna be left with nothing. I don’t want you to get blindsided by it.” Vanessa rubs at her temples, tries to will away the headache blooming behind her skull that’s making her feel a little dizzier than usual. 

“I want the good days, sure. But the bad days, too. Someone to be there - don’t tell me you don’t need it, ‘cause I don’t care - when things feel low. When the rounds don’t sound promising. When a certain medication isn’t working anymore. For all of it.” Brooke reaches out a hand across the bed, close enough for Vanessa to reach. Vanessa has to grab the bed railing with her other hand to keep herself steady as she reaches for Brooke’s, tries not to give into the spots darkening on the sides of her vision.

Brooke squeezes her fingers and the pressure pulls her back down, keeps her head from exploding just yet. Vanessa takes a deep breath, in through her nose, out of her mouth. She’s not sure why it’s worse all of a sudden, why Brooke’s voice sounds a little warped. But she keeps listening. 

Even though something is wrong. Very, very wrong.

“You don’t have to protect me from you. That’s not your job-”

“Brooke.” Vanessa pulls a gasp in, tries to fill up her lungs because they feel empty, too empty, like she has no oxygen left in her body. 

The monitors above her are speeding up but the beeping is far away, like it’s in a different room, and so is Brooke’s voice (‘Ness? _Ness!’_ ), especially when she yells out for a nurse with a voice so hysterical that Vanessa wants to reach out and comfort her. Not that she can, by the way her lungs are clawing for air, the way her chest is burning up from her shoulder to her heart, the way her arms are tingling like they’re on fire. She’s warm, too warm, her forehead becoming damp with sweat because she can feel her heart pushing itself, on its last legs, trying to keep her going, but- 

Oh, god.

Vanessa’s staved it off for thirteen years, kept her shitty heart pumping for thirteen whole years, but it hasn’t been enough, not nearly enough. Because she’s twenty-six in a hospital bed and so close, _so close_ to a new heart that she won’t have the chance to receive, not anymore.

She’d been so close. Fuck. 

Staying awake and hanging on is too hard, too much of a task to try and push her body to do, even with doctors and nurses pressing down with hard compressions on her chest while yelling about calling a code blue. And so Vanessa lets thoughts of Brooke’s hair and the way she so desperately wants to run her hands through it take her over until there’s-

Nothing at all. 

* * *

The first time Vanessa had been put under was when she was six and had her tonsils taken out. She’d forgotten most of it aside from the aftermath of ice cream and endless reruns of _The Magic School Bus,_ the show just a little much for her addled brain to follow. She’d gone back to school a few days later with no problems at all, the haze of anaesthesia from the surgery remembered the same way as her nightly dreams - just a little bit out there, a little bit nonsensical. Nothing that had stuck in her brain for too long. 

As she got older, anaesthesia simply became a part of her life. Necessary for the surgeries as doctor after doctor tried to find solutions to keep her alive, none of which lasted, her heart falling back into disarray each time. She’d gotten used to it - being in and out of it after a procedure, waiting for her brain to become less and less foggy with time until everything went back to normal. 

Back then, it was never unending. 

* * *

Vanessa sees Brooke’s face a lot. Brooke dancing, despite the fact that she’s never seen it in person, only on Brooke’s phone screen. Brooke as a dancer in the corps, Brooke performing as a prima ballerina and spinning round and round and round, dancing in a way Vanessa can only dream of. Her final bow is graceful, a demure smile on her face as she waves to the crowd. 

Vanessa wonders what it would be like, being the one to bring Brooke a bouquet of flowers at the end of a show. 

She sees her dad, too, but the memories are fleeting, blurry. Little snapshots, like the time they went to the carnival along with her mom and he rode all of the rickety rides with her. The way her dad would take her to get ice cream after church on Sundays, and they’d sit outside the shop and eat on the bench while people watching. How her dad would always lift her up, sit her on his shoulders whenever she was a little too sleepy, a little too tired to walk anymore. 

She sees glimpses of his funeral too, the way the priest had pronounced his last name ( _their_ last name) wrong. 

Though the pictures fade as quickly as they come, the pain not sticking around long enough to have a chance to burn her soul. 

Vanessa sees images from now, too. Or at least, what could be now. Beeping noises that never quite fade, ones boring into her skull that she wishes she could turn off. Hushed conversations, doctors and nurses talking about LVADs and the transplant list, but she can’t get her brain to focus, to tune in for long enough to know if it’s even real, or just another dream. 

She hears Brooke’s soft voice whispering to her (which surely, surely must be a dream), a light squeeze on her hand as Brooke tells her about the woman in the room across from them, about how her nurse is going on a date tonight, about how the neuro resident has a crush on the unit clerk. About how much Vanessa needs to be okay, needs to get better, because Brooke-

Vanessa never hears the end of her sentence, because Brooke always cuts herself off when she gets to that part. 

There are times when Vanessa starts feeling every little pain in her body, when everything becomes real and tangible and she’s suddenly aware of the wires along her arms, the tube down her throat that’s taken over her breathing, and it’s too much, too much to handle when she tries to move and nurses begin to yell about pain meds and-

It never lasts for long, though, her mind wiping itself clean of the here and now and going back to broadcasting pictures of Brooke and the way she smiles. 

* * *

Vanessa’s too small right now, in Brooke’s eyes. 

The tube down her airway that’s keeping her alive looks like it’s taking up her entire face, while the IV lines in her arms are too big, too invasive. Like all the wires around her are going to drown her, kill her instead.

Brooke would be convinced that they are, were it not for the monitors behind Vanessa’s bed, the ones displaying her vital signs and signalling that she’s still very much alive.

Somehow.

Brooke wants to close her eyes, forget that all of this is happening and somehow just go back to their shared hospital room, before she’d been discharged and before Vanessa had collapsed with wide eyes and gasping breaths. When everything had been a little bit more normal.

Normal for them, at least.

But when Brooke closes her eyes now, all she can see is the way that the nurse had been pushing down hard on Vanessa’s chest, doing compressions that looked like they were crushing rather than reviving her. All she can hear is the flatline of the monitors, the rush of footsteps of the code blue team to their room. The way they’d intubated Vanessa right then and there. The way Brooke had been frozen in place, gripping her sheets so tightly that she’d nearly ripped them.

The way the bed beside her had been so empty without Vanessa after she’d been whisked away, the room a little bit too quiet.

The way Brooke hadn’t even known if Vanessa would still be alive.

The limbo was the worst. Vanessa had been in surgery, after the team had intubated and stabilized her and Brooke had been left in their room all alone, signs of Vanessa still lingering everywhere. The stack of romance novels on Vanessa’s bedside table, the ones Brooke had teased her for. The makeup beside them, all MAC because _‘imma take that employee discount, thank you very much’._

Being discharged had almost felt like a sense of relief, for Brooke. Being able to leave their room behind, one filled with laughter and affection for the girl who shared it with her, but also filled with fear. With the look on Vanessa’s face before she’d collapsed, the wide eyes and slightly parted lips that showed that she’d known what had happened. 

The inevitable had finally arrived. 

But it’s been three days, and she’s still here, Vanessa’s still here. Vanessa’s still alive. The hospital bracelet around Brooke’s wrist is gone, denoting that she’s healthy enough to survive on her own after the warpath her appendix had carved, but she’s still here. She’s not going to leave, not now. 

She’d heard Dr. West talking about the transplant list, about how Vanessa’s urgent status has moved her up. How there’s a chance she can get a heart, how she won’t have to rely on an LVAD like she is right now.

Brooke so desperately wants it to be true.

“I miss you.” Brooke’s not sure where the words come from, why she whispers them as if Vanessa can hear them. Maybe she can, Brooke doesn’t know. But all Brooke knows is that she needs Vanessa back, because her own heart feels like it’s collapsing in on itself.

Part of her hates Vanessa. For keeping just how bad things are from her. For pretending that everything is fine and dandy while inching closer and closer to death’s door. 

Vanessa had said that Brooke would leave, that she didn’t care enough. That Brooke _should_ leave because she deserved better than seeing Vanessa deteriorate and it still makes her so mad, that Vanessa had thought that it would be the better option. That Vanessa had wanted to do it alone. 

That Vanessa had thought Brooke would be able to leave her behind. 

But Brooke can’t. She fucking can’t. She’s only known Vanessa for a couple of months, but it feels like it’s been so much longer, when she looks back at it. All the days and nights they’d spent together talking about everything and nothing had made Brooke fall hard, as much as she doesn’t want to admit it now. 

A couple months that had felt like a lifetime in their hospital beds. 

She imagines what it would be like if they’d met somewhere outside, maybe at MAC. Brooke goes in there often to buy her favourite brow pencil and transition eyeshadow that she uses on stage, because the drugstore brands simply don’t cut it for those two items. She pictures going in, seeing Vanessa and her smile that never fails to light up a room. 

God, she’d probably be head over heels for her right then and there. 

Brooke pictures flirting with Vanessa over the makeup counter, asking her opinion on which shades look best on her. She can almost see how animated Vanessa’s face would be, talking about her favourite products in the store the way her face always had been when they’d had these conversations in their hospital beds. 

Getting to know Vanessa outside of the hospital, away from the tubes and wires that reflected the breakdown of her heart. A scenario where they’d have endless time to get closer and closer because there wouldn’t be any time limits, not really. None holding them back. 

To be fair, Brooke hadn’t known that their time right now would be so limited, either. That Vanessa would be intubated, on life support, with everyone else hoping and praying that the wires keeping her alive are working. 

Brooke needs Vanessa back. She hasn’t even told Vanessa how much she cares about her, how important she’s become to her life and how is she going to keep going if Vanessa doesn’t pull through? 

Brooke stares down at Vanessa’s sleeping form, her chest rising and falling methodically to the rhythm of the machine that’s filling up her lungs with oxygen. Vanessa’s closed eyes make Brooke realize that there’s a chance she may never see her eye roll again, or the way she sticks up one finger when she wants to interrupt her. Or that she may have to watch TV shows without Vanessa’s insane commentary. 

Brooke buries the thoughts as far down as possible, because there can’t be a reality where she loses Vanessa. It can’t happen. 

Somehow, Brooke’s heart has completely fallen for another person. One whose own heart could be the cause of her end at the ripe old age of twenty-six. 

The way that life plays out its cards can be cruel. Leaving people like Vanessa with a short stick, a life too short that’s marred with uncertainty and a fight to stay alive. 

The calmness in Vanessa’s face right now, as she’s out and sedated, makes Brooke realize just how weary Vanessa had become the last couple weeks. The way that the lines in her face had become more pronounced, the circles darker under her eyes, the undertones sallower in her skin. 

Vanessa had done such a good job of keeping it inside, of pretending everything was okay. Of playing things up with Brooke, acting like everything was fine and that _she_ was fine despite the shortness of her breath and the way her hands would shake as she’d try to sit herself up.

Vanessa had been fighting so, so hard. Brooke feels a pang in her chest, a guilt, that she hadn’t realized the extent of it herself.

Sure, there’s not much Brooke would have been able to do, having no medical knowledge. But she could have listened to her vent. Held her hand. Distracted her. 

It’s eating at her, now. Should she have done more? Known that she should have done more?

She hopes Vanessa will understand when she wakes up.

_If_ she wakes up. 

* * *

There’s times when the pictures that float by in Vanessa’s mind become clearer than others. More realistic, almost tangible. Like when Vanessa sees Brooke sitting beside her, and can almost feel the way Brooke’s running her fingers through her hair. She wants to lean into the imagined touch, but doesn’t want it to disappear back into her subconscious. 

Brooke’s whispering to her to _wake up, baby_ and telling her about how she hasn’t been intubated for days, how she doesn’t even need extra oxygen anymore, because her new heart’s working and it’s working _well._ How Vanessa’s finally, finally, healing. 

It’s a nice dream. Vanessa can see the way Brooke’s worry lines are beginning to relax, her shoulders a little less tense. The way her eyes are full of happiness - weariness still, yes, and a little bit of trepidation - but also full of _relief._

She’s glad this dream Brooke is happy, the way Brooke should always be. 

Dream Brooke lets out a little sniffle and it makes Vanessa want to frown, because she doesn’t want her to be upset, but then Brooke is pressing a kiss to her forehead before calling out for her nurse. A nurse who shines a light into her eyes, asks her questions like what day it is and where she is and Vanessa wants to answer, she does, but she’s never had such realistic dreams before.

“Thank god, thank god, thank _god.”_ Brooke is squeezing her hand and Vanessa can nearly feel it, while hearing the shakiness in her voice. “Fuck.”

Vanessa opens her mouth and her voice is all but gone, barely above a whisper, but she needs to know for sure. “Dream?” 

Brooke lets out a little noise in between a laugh and sob, squeezes her hand tighter, tight enough that it’s tangible, something Vanessa can feel. “Not a dream.” 

Huh. 

There’s a prick on Vanessa’s arm, making her wince as her nurse takes her blood. The ever present beep of the monitors is still there behind her, the bustle in the hallway outside too, but things are different. 

Vanessa looks at Brooke, really looks. She’s tired and worn, in a sweater and jeans and it’s the first time Vanessa’s seen her in something other than the ever present hospital gowns. She’s folded in on herself on top of her chair, legs crossed as she leans forward and she lets out a little laugh when Vanessa flips over her wrist, looks for the telltale hospital bracelet. 

“They let me out a week and a half ago. I’m not leaving, though.” Brooke lifts an eyebrow, almost as a challenge, and the words sink on top of Vanessa’s heart and warm it from the inside out, making it glow. 

Brooke’s still here.

“A week and a half? How long have I been-”

Vanessa pauses, because she’s not sure if she wants to know just yet. But it’s long enough for her voice to be gone, long enough for Brooke to have been discharged.

Yet still be here.

So Vanessa changes directions, saves the tougher questions for later. “Your ass ain’t sore from that chair yet?”

Brooke snorts. “It is, but not as much as your mom’s. She’s been complaining about how uncomfortable the chairs are for days.”

Vanessa’s breath hitches in her throat, because Brooke’s just said-

“My mom?” 

Her mom’s here? But-

Brooke points at a sleeping figure in the corner of the room, one whom Vanessa had completely missed earlier because _Brooke_ is in front of her but her eyes aren’t lying to her, because it’s her mom. 

“She’s been here since before your surgery. Surgeries. Signed the consent forms as the substitute decision maker and all that. She hasn’t left, either.” Brooke’s voice is soft.

Vanessa can feel a lump building in her throat, a mixture of relief and questions ( _Why now? Why not before? Will you go again?_ ) that she’s not sure her mom will even answer. 

Questions that Vanessa’s not even sure she wants the answer to, just yet.

“Consent forms for what?” Vanessa has to hold back a laugh at Brooke’s incredulous expression. “Bitch, I’ve been outta commission, how am I supposed to know?”

“You got a heart.” 

The words hit Vanessa’s chest one after the other, nearly knocking her down four times over because it’s hard to distinguish between dreams and reality anymore, but Brooke’s squeezing her hand and pressing a kiss to her forehead and she so, so badly wants it to be real. 

“You better not be playing.” Brooke better not be, because if Vanessa’s gotten a new heart that means she’s somehow gotten off the waiting list and she’s _gone and survived_ and she’s going to have another chance at everything. 

“What, did you think those sutures along your sternum are just for fun?” Brooke’s tone is light, teasing, but Vanessa can see the way her eyes shine, the way they’re holding back a flood of emotions. “You really did.”

“But-how?” It makes no sense, because Vanessa wasn’t very high up, she’s supposed to still have to wait months to years for a heart-

“Turns out going into heart failure and having an LVAD wire rockets you up the list.” The laugh Brooke lets out is one of disbelief. “They kept you alive in the ICU until they got you one.”

“Jesus.” Vanessa’s brain isn’t wrapping itself around the concept just yet, despite the dressings on her chest and the IVs in her arms, because after waiting so long, it doesn’t feel like it’s real. Vanessa had previously thought she’d be more alert for the process, at least. “If I knew before that having a code blue was all it took to get a brand spanking new heart-”

“Don’t you even joke about that.” Brooke swats at her arm. “I never want to think about that code again.”

Brooke’s voice is light but Vanessa can see the way her eyes cast downwards, how her hands shake slightly. The little breath she lets out. 

Shit, Vanessa knows that going through it on her end was terrible, but watching someone else? It’s almost worse, seeing the way Brooke’s trying to hard to keep it together, to keep her from noticing.

“God, I thought I’d really lost you.” Brooke sniffles and Vanessa wants to reach out, wipe the stray tear on her cheek but Brooke’s too damn tall even when she’s sitting. 

“I’m still here. Ain’t going anywhere just yet.” Vanessa doesn’t know if the words are true, or how much to believe them. But she wants them to be true. “Still got episodes of _90 Day Fiance_ to catch up on with you.”

“The most important reason, huh?” Brooke lets out a giggle as she brings a hand up to brush her cheek, and even her crying face is still damn adorable. Vanessa’s impressed.

“Nah, the most important reason is you.”

Vanessa’s always been one of those people who falls too hard, too fast. Falling for a girl on the same subway car or for a cashier at the grocery store. Falling for the occasional pretty nurse that smiles at her more than the rest of them do. 

But Brooke’s different. Vanessa’s not even sure if she’d call it love, not really. Not yet. But Brooke had given her a reason to hold on, push on the last few weeks, then had taken over her subconscious while she’d been out. Brooke’s full of possibilities and a beacon of hope for a future, one that Vanessa hopes they can at least partly experience together.

Brooke’s seen her at her worst. She’s seen what Vanessa’s been through and stuck around despite it. Vanessa herself isn’t an expert on women (she’d leave that title to her MAC coworker, A’keria), but she can tell when she’s found someone special.

And Brooke, sweet perfect Brooke, who hides so much softness in her heart that only comes out when she trusts someone enough, is exactly that. 

And Brooke’s still here. Which means she hadn’t listened to Vanessa when Vanessa had told her to leave, to save herself from pain that she didn’t need. But she’s stayed. She’s been here at Vanessa’s bedside for the entire time, it seems, from the way she’s folded up in the chair like she knows it so well, the way her jacket is in a corner of the room, a pile of her books on Vanessa’s bedside table. 

Brooke hasn’t had to, but she’s stayed. And Vanessa’s beginning to realize that maybe, there’s no way that Brooke could have brought herself to leave. 

Vanessa traces her thumb in circles in Brooke’s palm, looks down at the patterns she’s drawing. “I dreamt about you.”

“Really?” 

“Yeah.” Vanessa thinks back to the Brooke in her subconscious, dancing around and still sitting at her bedside and whispering soft things while being the most beautiful sight Vanessa’s ever seen. And remaining so now, too. “Dancing around like the Sugar Plum Fairy you are.”

Brooke snorts, but the adoration in her eyes shines through, makes Vanessa feel like she’s floating, like maybe, maybe, there’s more for them. A future. “There’s so much I gotta teach you about ballet.”

“I ain’t going on my tippy toes, though. That’s your job.”

“Noted.” Brooke’s smile is soft, but Vanessa’s ready to let it power her for days. “Though you’d be a good dancer.”

“You say that as if I can keep my ass sitting up for more than half an hour at a time.” Vanessa tries to picture herself back on her feet, dancing and running around, and the thought feels far away, from a distant life.

“Soon, you’ll be able to.” Brooke’s smile is soft and Vanessa can’t help but grin back, because all the hope and the possibilities that are laid out in front of her, in front of _them_ , are right within her grasp. 

“Yeah. Soon.”


	3. chapter three (epilogue)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> But now, Vanessa gets to be part of it, too. She gets to show Brooke her favourite places to eat, her favourite places to go. She can introduce Brooke to her own friends that she’s beginning to reconnect with, bring her to work and get her the friends and family MAC discount because Brooke’s always complaining about the amount of makeup she has to buy for ballet.
> 
> She can take Brooke on a date. 
> 
> That is, if Brooke wants to. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've made it to this chapter, the epilogue, thank you. This story was a rollercoaster to write, and I am so grateful for all the sweet comments and feedback on it. I dunno if I would delve into subject matter like this one again, but it's definitely pushed me to follow through on stories and become a stronger writer in the process. Special thanks to barbie and writ for being wonderful cheerleaders with this story, I love you both <33

“Three life sentences later and I’m _free!”_ Vanessa throws her arms up in the air, nearly losing control of the walker that she’s started to need less and less every day. 

“Mija, keep your voice down. Everyone in the lobby’s looking over at us.” Vanessa’s mother swats at her arm as they walk out the front doors of the hospital, ones that she’s not going to have to see for a long, long time.

Well, until her next appointment with her cardiologist. But still.

“I can’t. This is some _Shawshank Redemption_ level shit. I’m finally outta here.” Vanessa ducks out of the way when her mom tries to swat at her shoulder again, nearly ramming into Brooke on her other side, who’s trying hard to keep from laughing. 

Brooke can’t help it, though, a little giggle escaping from her lips, and Vanessa can’t help but wink back because she’s happy, so happy.

She’s made it through the months of rehab after her transplant, the endless therapy to gain her strength back. Learning to walk again, getting her voice back and stronger than before, being able to do things by herself the way she should be. 

Vanessa feels powerful. 

Sure, she’s still going to have appointments that she needs to go to, more check ups and physiotherapy to make her body even stronger, but it doesn’t matter. Because finally, finally, she’s going to have more to life than a hospital room. 

Vanessa already has, in a way, with Brooke around. Dropping by the rehab unit after her ballet training, telling Vanessa all about how she’s been building her own strength back up, too. Bringing in different snacks each time for the two of them to try together while they binge watch more trash TV. Cheering Vanessa on as she practices walking in physio, as she’s able to do more and more every single day. 

But now, Vanessa gets to be part of it, too. She gets to show Brooke her favourite places to eat, her favourite places to go. She can introduce Brooke to her own friends that she’s beginning to reconnect with, bring her to work and get her the friends and family MAC discount because Brooke’s always complaining about the amount of makeup she has to buy for ballet.

She can take Brooke on a _date._

That is, if Brooke wants to. 

* * *

They drop Vanessa’s mom at her house - technically Vanessa’s house too, after she’d had to move back in a couple of months before being admitted to hospital. When she hadn’t been able to clean her apartment anymore, make herself dinner, because she’d become weak and tired before finishing either. When her heart couldn’t take the strain of simple household tasks any longer.

In rehab, she’d practiced cooking again with her occupational therapist, practiced getting dressed on her own. Practiced all the little things that someone should be able to do on their own, abilities that had slipped from Vanessa’s grasp as she had become weaker and weaker. But now? Vanessa’s stronger. She has to take it slow, yes, but she’s getting there. She can do things on her own again.

The prospect of independence makes Vanessa feel limitless. She doesn’t need others to do simple tasks for her anymore. She can take care of herself, hell, she’s been cleared to go back to work. She’s not reliant on anyone anymore, which means that she can move back out again soon, too. 

Not that she’s been at her mom’s house in months, what with being in hospital and all. She just doesn’t want to stay, to stagnate. 

Brooke looks at Vanessa from the driver’s seat after they drop the hospital bags with Vanessa’s belongings in them in the front entrance. It’s been months since Vanessa’s gotten her heart, months of her getting stronger and stronger and more independent, but Brooke still looks at her with a dusting of awe on her features. Like she can’t quite believe that she’s looking at her, that she’s there. 

Brooke’s gazes are always filled with emotions that Vanessa can’t quite decipher, but ones that are enough to make the heat rise to her cheeks, have her heart (her _new_ heart) turn over in her chest. Because there’s so many unsaid things between them, so much that they haven’t talked about because they haven’t had the chance to, but now that Vanessa’s out of the hospital?

They’re going to have the chance, and the time. Endless time, time that had felt like it was being snatched away while Vanessa was in the hospital.

But not anymore.

“So, where do you want to go?” 

Brooke’s question makes Vanessa pause. Sure, Brooke’s asking about options for lunch. But the question feels so much deeper, like it could be about everything in Vanessa’s life.

Where _is_ she going to go? What is she going to do?

The possibilities feel endless. She’s going to go back to work because she misses it, being able to put people together with a handful of products. Maybe she’ll start working out again once she gets cleared to do so from her doctor. Maybe she can watch Brooke dance, maybe Brooke can teach her some dance steps herself. 

Vanessa’s life isn’t restricted anymore. She can make her own decisions, have the chance to try out different things.

But for now, for the first choice she’s going to make with her newfound freedom?

“Let’s get some Chipotle.”

* * *

“Can I look yet?” 

“No, no, no, no, _no.”_ Vanessa twirls in place before flopping back on the mattress in front of Brooke, dropping the makeup products in her hands into the bed. “I ain’t done. You still need glitter.”

“Glitter?”

“Yes, glitter. This ain’t gonna be a boring look. Now stay still.” 

Brooke raises an eyebrow but acquiesces, letting Vanessa dust her cheek lightly with her finger. Vanessa can feel the familiar routine of doing makeup settle into her bones, make everything feel like it should, the way it used to. 

Vanessa’s had a couple of shifts back at work - not too long, only half days to start - but they’ve gone _well._ She’s able to restock the shelves, do makeup on clients, stay on her feet for hours at a time. Each step she’s able to take feels like she’s dreaming, like she shouldn’t be able to. 

But Vanessa is. She finally is. 

Brooke had picked her up from work today since she’d had the day off, intent on spending the evening eating comfort food and watching TLC. But then Brooke had seen the coloured liner on Vanessa’s lids, the dark lipstick and she’d brought up the question that she’d asked months and months ago, back when they were both still sharing a hospital room.

_You’d said you’d do my makeup one day, remember?_

And so Vanessa’s gotten Brooke sitting ever so still on her bed, mapping out her face like a canvas with contour and highlight and cut creases. She feels like she’s on a roll, like she never wants to stop, not when Brooke is her favourite new client. The most beautiful client she’s ever seen, one who still gives Vanessa soft little butterflies in her chest even after months and months of knowing her.

Vanessa brushes some excess setting powder off of Brooke’s cheeks, removes the clips in Brooke’s hair that have been holding her locks out of the way. She can’t help the little noise of excitement that she lets out, poking Brooke’s shoulder until she turns around and faces the mirror. 

“Done.”

Brooke opens her eyes and looks in the mirror, and the gasp that leaves her mouth makes Vanessa want to dance around.

“Holy shit, Ness. You’ve made me look _good_.” Brooke’s turning her face slightly, looking at it from all angles. “How did you give me cheekbones?”

“You’ve always had cheekbones. Real easy to make you look good when the source material is already so beautiful.”

It’s true. Vanessa’s seen Brooke in all sorts of states. In the hospital, makeup free, hair mussed. In her stage makeup, looking like a doll in pointe shoes. Sleepy when she wakes up from a nap, makeup smudged on her face no matter how many times Vanessa tells her to take it off before she passes out. Somehow always perfect.

But Brooke’s cheeks flush crimson at her words just the same, her eyes ducking down. It’s still thrilling somehow, the fact that she’s known Brooke for what _feels_ like ages yet some things still feel so new, so unexplored. Mostly because life had kept them from getting the chance to do so - the hospital stays, the near death moments that took a little bit more precedence over getting to flirt with Brooke the way she wanted to.

But not anymore. And Vanessa’s going to take it.

“Shut up.” Brooke’s cheeks are still pink but Vanessa can see the pleased look in her eyes, the way she keeps glancing up at her reflection. 

“Prettier than every single one of those models in the MAC makeup ads.” Vanessa leans on Brooke’s shoulder - not because she’s tired or needs to rest, but because it’s nice. Comfortable. 

“Liar.” Brooke’s smile is soft when Vanessa lifts her head back up, and Vanessa realizes how close they’re actually sitting. 

Vanessa gives her a cheeky grin back, one that makes Brooke’s smile grow. Vanessa loves the sight. “Never lied in my whole life, Miss B.” 

“You lied to your nurse that one time when you hid a bag of potato chips as a snack in your bedsheets.”

Vanessa sticks out her tongue at Brooke, making her crack up. “No idea what you’re talking about.”

Vanessa notices how long Brooke’s eyelashes are when they settle into a silence, when Brooke grabs her hands and starts to draw patterns all over her palms. 

“I remember when I’d hold onto your hand when sitting in your room in the ICU, months ago. You wouldn’t squeeze back, asleep and all that. But your hands were still warm. Your pulse was beating by your wrist.” Brooke’s voice is soft and she doesn’t look up, continues tracing along Vanessa’s lifeline, her heartline. “It made me believe that maybe, just maybe, things would be okay. If your body was still fighting that hard to keep going.”

“Can’t keep me down for nothing.” Vanessa puts a finger under Brooke’s chin, lifts her face up to look at her. She can still see the residual haze behind her eyes, made up of the weeks and weeks of uncertainty that they’d both gone through, so close to having everything go wrong, despite the fact that it’s been months since then. Months of Vanessa healing more and more. 

The fear is still there. 

“I’m still here. And I ain’t going anywhere. Not now, not when I have you.” Vanessa pauses after the words leave her, because-

Does she have Brooke?

Conceptually, Vanessa knows that she does. She knows that Brooke’s become her best friend and favourite person to talk to and spend time with and she never ever wants to lose her, but-

But then Brooke kisses her, grabs her face with both of her hands and her lips are soft, so soft and Vanessa can’t help but gasp when they break the kiss, when Brooke’s forehead is against hers and they’re both trembling slightly. 

Vanessa looks up, her lips parting unintentionally and Brooke’s eyes are as wide as hers, her chest rising and falling and she looks like she’s about to apologize, pull back, and Vanessa can’t help but close the distance between them once more. 

Kissing Brooke feels like the first time Vanessa had gotten to walk without a walker again. An action so new, so novel, one that makes her pulse race and her head spin, but also one that feels familiar. Like home. Like this is what they’re meant to be doing, what they both deserve. Brooke tightens her arms around her waist, pulls her closer and Vanessa’s never felt like she’s fit anywhere better than within Brooke’s embrace.

Vanessa pulls back and Brooke’s face is lit up brighter than the sun and the little laugh that leaves her is one that feels like a bit of release, one that they’ve both needed for so long. Vanessa almost doesn’t want to let go of Brooke, move farther back from her ever again, because it feels right. Safe. Like home. 

Brooke’s her home. 

Not the hospital, not her mom’s house. But rather her home is a person, someone who’s taken over her heart despite her objections, who’s been through so much with her. 

Vanessa never wants to let her go. 

“I wanted to do that for so long.” Brooke whispers the words, as if speaking any louder will break the spell and shatter whatever is keeping them in each other’s grasp. 

Vanessa presses a little kiss to the corner of Brooke’s mouth because she can’t help it, can’t keep herself back. “Why didn’t you?”

Brooke shoots her a look. “Why do you think?”

“What, that little hospital stay?” Vanessa waves a hand airily, holds back a laugh when Brooke raises an eyebrow. It’s not joking material yet, not really. But almost. 

“I don’t think your old dinky little heart would have survived a kiss from me, do you?” Brooke snickers and Vanessa feels her own mouth drop open.

“As _if._ ” She shoves Brooke’s shoulder but can’t help but giggle too, join in Brooke’s laughter. 

“Imagine if I’d kissed you and your heart rate monitor sped up and started beeping faster. That would have been hysterical.” Brooke looks smug, too smug, and Vanessa groans at the thought.

“God, don’t even start. That would have been embarrassing.” Vanessa shudders, then pauses. Because sure, back then, Vanessa would have cared, but…

“Feel it now.” Vanessa grabs Brooke’s hand from where it’s resting on her waist, presses it on her chest. 

Above her heart. Her new, working heart that’s beating strong, so strong, pumping blood and oxygen around her body and keeping her alive. Letting her kiss Brooke.

Brooke’s hand is warm under hers, pressing to the side of her breastbone and her lips part, her eyes widening. “It’s fast.”

“All you, baby.” 

Now that they’re both out in the open with what they’ve been holding back (Brooke’s kissed her, _kissed her_ ), the words feel natural rolling off of Vanessa’s tongue. Like she’s been keeping so many things back from Brooke for her own good but now she can tell her, have her know that she cares. 

Vanessa drops her head against Brooke, their hands still pressing above her heart and it feels so right, so perfect. As if today hadn’t been their first kiss but more like their hundredth, as if they’ve been like this forever. She fists her hands in Brooke’s shirt, relishing in how close she is, how she can almost feel Brooke’s breathing. 

“I’m glad we’re here now.” Brooke lifts her head up before leaning in to kiss her again but Vanessa pauses, pushes her back slightly.

“Hold up. I know it’s liquid lipstick, but you’re gonna make it smudge. That took real effort.”

Brooke snorts. “Don’t care.”

Vanessa can’t even protest when Brooke leans in again, because the heart beating fast in her chest may not be hers, but it’s strong. It’s showing her that she’s alive, how lucky she is, and how Brooke has captured it and made it hers, one hundred percent. Something Vanessa doesn’t want to change for the world.

Vanessa won’t have to, not when Brooke’s holding her this tight, this close. Not after they’ve both made it through the worst of the worst to get here, coming out the other side with two beating hearts that are in sync, the way they’ll always stay.

**Author's Note:**

> find me at @plastiquetiaras on tumblr!


End file.
